On May 10, 2013 Greenville County held its 3rd Annual Cardiac Arrest Survivor Ceremony at the Embassy Suites. Survivors and Honorees filled the room reunited again. Since beginning these ceremonies in 2010, cardiac arrest survivors have more than doubled. The annual ceremony honors those individuals and organizations that made each of those life saving events possible.
“It was no more than half a century ago that we would never conceive this type of ceremony. EMS was such a new thing. My message to you is to keep doing what you’re doing because it’s working,” said John Zaragosa, Director of Greenville County EMS.
Along with medical and community speakers was video of survivors telling their stories of their life-threatening experiences. One such story was that of Rick Murtaugh, a father to a then 10-day old daughter. The day before his cardiac arrest he had a seizure. Scared and not wanting to be an additional burden to his wife dealing with a newborn, he had his wife take him over to his parents’ house.
After arriving at his parents’ house, Murtaugh began convulsing. The convulsions stopped when his heart stopped. Murtaugh’s father performed CPR until EMS arrived and took over. Murtaugh was the first survivor to this type of EMS intervention.
“(Rescue) happens before you get to the hospital…It is so important that we get you there alive,” said Marty Lutz, MD Greenville County Medical Director.
In just two years, Greenville County EMS increased its number of survivors from 4% to 11%. The national average is 8% with more than half requiring long-term care. Greenville County’s 11% discharge rate is just comprised of those with quality neurological outcomes. This increase is due to intensive training, improvement in therapeutic hypothermia and aggressive post-resuscitation management.
“County Council…has (the public’s safety) first in our minds. I think if you examine the way we spend our tax dollars you’ll find that we give a high priority to public safety,” said Bob Taylor, Chairman Greenville County Council.
May 20th, there will be changes in protocol. If someone calls for an ambulance they won’t necessarily get one. If someone has sprained their ankle a week earlier and calls for another incident, they won’t automatically get the EMS.
“That is not a bad thing. That is a very good thing because what we have is medical priority dispatch,” said Lutz. “This is an enhancement to our system. This is not a take away from anybody.”
Medical Priority Dispatch allows dispatch to look at calls and determine which calls are low priority. Calls will be rolled to a nurse from 9 am to 9 pm seven days a week to ensure that ambulances are available for real emergencies.
The Greenville County EMS Communications Center was awarded the Accredited Center of Excellence certification from the National Academies of Emergency Dispatch. There is only one of 155 EMS Communications
Centers in the world with this distinction.
